uh, Charlie Towler was the main history teacher and his load got toheavy and that why they asked me to come in and take it over and he wasteaching poly/sci, so I took over the poly/sci. I want to get some ofthat on tape so I'm going to start it right now. Okay. The followingis a unrehearsed interview uh for the for the University of KentuckyLibrary Community College System Project. Uh, my name is John Klee.I'm interviewing Robert Cetrulo at his home in Ludlow uh, it is May10, 2007.

CETRULO: Well, I was raised in downtown Covington on Delmar Place right

behind St. Elizabeth Hospital and uh, went to St. Benedict Grade1:00School there and then went to high school in Cincinnati, St. Xavierand then Xavier University, uh pre-law, and then uh University ofKentucky College of Law.

KLEE: Okay. Uh, you were uh, uh there--was this extension at, were you

aware of this extension, UK extension in Northern Kentucky?

CETRULO: At the time of my education?

KLEE: Well, I mean--

CETRULO: No

KLEE: When did you come aware of it?

CETRULO: Actually, I knew a little bit about it well after I graduated

from law school in 1957, uh I knew of its existence and then uh Iforgotten just how the contact was made someone knew me and uh Iwas uh had just begun practicing law uh and someone knew me and uhindicated that the faculty member that the Dr. Talburt, who taughthistory and poly/sci had become his, his, his workload had becomeburdened, overburdened and so they wanted someone to fill in and teachthe poly/sci course uh and so I was delighted to do that and began in2:001957, fifty years ago this October as a matter of fact and my firstclass was supposed to be on October the 8th, I remember, because thatday was the day of the birth of my first child, Kathleen, and I end upat the hospital instead of class. (laughs) So I had to miss my firstday of class, so I began there and I taught there for eleven yearspart-time every semester and taught a course in American Government,Constitutional Law.

KLEE: Uh, you were practicing law at the same time you were teaching?

CETRULO: Yes, I only had the one course uh every semester.

KLEE: Political science. And how did they set that up? Was it a night

course?

CETRULO: No. It was a day course, as I recall, and uh I think maybe

a couple of days a week, I've forgotten, but I could fit it and mypractice was close and I just--

KLEE: Sure, whipped over there. What kind of students were going to the

center uh in that time period?

CETRULO: Well, we had uh a mix, I suppose. We had you typical college

age student who was just out of high school or going to college fulltime and then you had a lot of people who were working and uh, uh3:00availing themselves of the services of the community college system.

KLEE: Uh, when you started, I guess what was it called, it was, what was

it calling itself? Do you remember?

CETRULO: It was called the University of Kentucky, uh Northern Extension

take uh most of the liberal arts courses uh, certainly English andhistory and poly/sci and accounting and journalism. A good friend ofmine who was a reporter for the Enquirer, where I had worked throughundergraduate school as a copyboy and reporter, uh was Bob Rankin andhe taught the course in uh journalism. So they had a lot of part-timepeople and they had a full-time faculty as well.

KLEE: Uh, centered strictly the first two years at one and two hundred

recognized and a friend of Dr. Clark and people like that, you knowwho were certainly preeminent in the field. Uh--

KLEE: You mentioned the Rankin who was in journalism.

CETRULO: Yeah. Uh Bob Rankin was a friend of mine. He was a reporter

5:00on the Kentucky Enquirer and I had worked with him where I began asa copyboy while I was at Xavier University in Cincinnati and became areporter before I went away to law school and,-- here's Ed Freshney.Ed Freshney was an insurance uh person and later became secretaryof state of Kentucky. Lived in Park Hills and ran for office and waselected secretary of state. Bob Knoff was a very well known musicianaffiliated with the University of Cincinnati as well as uh the centerand uh affiliated with the uh Cincinnati Symphonic Orchestra. Uh, so wehad a mix of very interesting people and many accomplished people uh--

KLEE: Did you have occasion to uh to uh have a lot of contact with these

people or--

CETRULO: Yes, I knew, I knew some of them before, you know--and here's

Nolan Charlie Dunn, he was a lawyer here in Cincinnati, Kentuckyrather. He specialized in real estate and that was his field ofteaching. Uh, so I knew of them before and others I got to know betterthrough involvement with the faculty and we would have social events6:00and we would attend the students' events and the dances and so forthand so it was, it was a collegial group of people.

KLEE: Tell me about the physical arrangements, you said you started in a

location. Where was that at?

CETRULO: Uh, it was then one of the district grade schools and I've

forgotten whether it was second or third district down on Sixth andMadison, Sixth and Scott Street, which was now called Three RiversSchool and it was directly opposite of what is now the public librarywhich wasn't at that location at the time. Uh, we were up on thethird floor there and uh uh uh then the, in short order, the facilitywas built up on top of the hill in Park Hills there you know at thebig bend of the Dixie Highway and it's shown on the cover of that uhbrochure which I've --

KLEE: Tell me that again. That was a new building.

CETRULO: That was new building.

KLEE: And where was it at?

CETRULO: At uh, in Park Hills, off the Dixie Highway. You could enter

off the Dixie Highway, at the big bend of the Dixie Highway, just atthe beginning of Park Hills, where Covington joins-- and uh it was anicely built building and had uh fine facilities. Uh, many classrooms,7:00lecture rooms, and conference rooms and uh uh, much better obviouslythan what we had before.

KLEE: And that was the college that became at least for a very brief

time, uh it was called Northern Kentucky Community College.

CETRULO: Right.

KLEE: You went, you were in this time period where it dovetailed, just

took a name change but the structure and so forth didn't really change.

CETRULO: I think that is correct.

KLEE: Uh huh. Yeah. Uh, tell me about some of the student activities.

I know that they did a lot of traditional kinds of things.

CETRULO: They did. Uh they had student associations and uh, and social

events and activities depending on the interest of the student andwhere they thought they were going professionally with their lives.Uh, so it was pretty active group of people. As I say, consideringsome of them were full-time employees, some were part-time employees,many were full-time students. Uh huh, so it was a mix of student body.

KLEE: Were there any students in those years that stood out in your--

anybody you remember stood out in mind?

CETRULO: I've had many interesting enough over the years, you know

8:00as you know when you teach uh people come up and remember you morethan you remember all of them and I've had jurors, or witnesses, as Ipracticed law, come up and say, "Oh, yes, you taught me such and suchthirty years ago." A few have become lawyers, people I know and whenuh, there are other faculty members there. I, one of the picturesI ran across, I was showing before we opened the tape here was I sawa picture of Peggy Birdlesman. And Peggy was teaching, she lived inFt. Thomas and she was married to Bill Birdlesman, a lawyer friend ofmine, and she was teaching English at the college uh, and uh Bill, herhusband, later become, became U. S. District judge for the northernfor this district, the eastern district of Kentucky, here in Covington.So, there were people there that I, both students and faculty, thatI've known before or become acquainted with then and have been uh goodfriends ever after.

KLEE: What about as you uh taught there did you hear anything about uh

the propriety of UK having classes in northern Kentucky. There's a9:00Thomas Moore's here, there's colleges across the river uh, was there anyfeeling that you know this didn't have a role or was it filling a need?

CETRULO: You know I never heard that issue aired as if to my knowledge

there was no dispute, there was no hostility, there was no, nocompetition in that sense of unhealthiness, uh, uh-- Thomas MooreCollege was and remains a small school, there were people who wentto Cincinnati. Uh it certainly filled a niche for people who uh uhdidn't want to go away at UK, uh live away from home, uh had familiesor economics were an issue. Uh, for a variety of reasons, it filled aniche for a variety of people with disparate situations.

KLEE: What kind of, what kind of enrollment did they have? What were you

class loads like?

CETRULO: You know, I'm not sure I can put a good handle on that, but I

can tell you that sometimes my classes were a great deal more that you10:00would like. When you grade a social science subject, as you well know,and give uh essay type questions, which was, which is the hatred ofteaching and I love teaching and I profited by it immensely, personallyin terms of my personal growth experience--but, uh, grading was aproblem, well, I probably, I'm sure there were times when I had 50 or60 students and sometimes more in a class. Uh --

KLEE: That's quite remarkable.

CETRULO: That's too many.

KLEE: (laughs) Yeah, right. Particularly grading essays or papers or

whatever. Uh, do you recall any of the politics or the transitionfrom this extension to the community college, remember the name changeor anything?

CETRULO: Not intimately because again I wasn't intimately involved

with administrative aspects of the experience there. Uh, I was simplyan adjunct professor and brought and taught the course in politicalscience, American Government and Constitutional Law. I taught it as a11:00constitutional law class because that's one of my great loves, one ofmy great courses in law school was constitutional law, under ProfessorOverster at UK and so I would teach cases and methodology and uh,federalism and uh all those subjects from the standpoint of reviewingthe development of the legal system of the United States, civil rights,individual rights, uh etc.

KLEE: What about --was--when they opened this building, you said uh

it was at Park Hills the, there at Dixie Highway ? Was the, was thereadequate parking, I mean was, I mean did it serve the needs, had labs,library?

CETRULO: All of the above and had a great big parking lot overlooking

Cincinnati on the hill there. Access was a bit of a problem. One ofthe main accesses was uh up the South Arlington Road and then down aprivate street, uh Park Hills had narrow streets and no sidewalks andparking on one side of the street and that was a problem. But then12:00they had an access down directly to the Dixie Highway which was evenmore widely used to the comfort of the residents as well as the thepeople using the school. But there was adequate parking, they hadlaboratories, they had science uh labs, they had uh nice library, uhconference rooms. It was a nice facility.

KLEE: Could you see it beginning to burst at the seams in those later

years?

CETRULO: Not really, it was fulfilling its need. It had a high

enrollment, but and probably as I say somewhat limited faculty. Therewas a problem I suppose the student ratio was probably not the mostdesirable, but in terms of, in terms of the quality of the instructionand in terms of the facilities, they were I'd say more than adequateeven the whole time I was there when I finally resigned because mypractice just made it more difficult after eleven years to continue thisteaching as much as I loved it. But uh, it was still serving its need.

KLEE: Uh as I said it was--when you left it was right at the time when

13:00the Northern uh, uh, what later became Northern Kentucky University,Northern Kentucky State College was born. Do you remember any of thatdiscussion, I mean did any of your, any of the other faculty or thepeople there talk about what was going on and how it was going to workout?

CETRULO: It certainly doesn't stick in my memory and therefore I'm

assuming it wasn't a burning topic of discussion.

KLEE: Yeah. Having lived in this area, did you, uh did you see a need

for the four year institution uh--

CETRULO: Clearly, clearly the area has grown and uh as you well know

being a member of the northern Kentucky community also at Somerset uhI mean at Maysville, uh and the growth has been significant and uh uhexperience has demonstrated that uh the need was there and of courseobviously people who then, many of whom would have gone to Lexington,14:00uh now go to uh Campbell County.

KLEE: Right. The uh what did the, did the connection to the University

of Kentucky mean anything to the instructors, to the students, uh tothe community?

CETRULO: I'd say it did. There was, there was a close relationship.

Uh, uh, there was communion and intercommunion. I remember when Iwas, after I'd been teaching a couple of years and practicing a coupleof years I was appointed by uh then federal judge Max Wenthrope fromCynthiana, who sat up here in Covington also in the federal court, toserve as U.S. Magistrate Judge for this district which was a part-timejudicial position. At the time, you could still practice law and dothat and uh I was appointed to that position and I got a congratulatoryletter from UK President Dickie and people were very much aware of whatwas going on, who the faculty members were and what they were doing.

KLEE: That's interesting, yeah. Uh, I'm kind of running through

my questions here uh, you're very succinct and to the point. You15:00mentioned that how teaching affected you and aided in your growth.How--talk, talk about that a little bit.

CETRULO: Well, it's like the musical play says, isn't it true by our

students we are taught, you know and uh I'm sure you've experiencedthat as a uh tenured professor and many years experience that uh theinteraction with students--the more you go over material, the moreinsights you obtain, and the more personal growth through study andparticipation you experience and so uh I found it very rewarding --

KLEE: You had to do research to do you lectures.

CETRULO: Exactly.

KLEE: Yeah. You mentioned that there were some subjects, I guess they

gave you some leeway in offering some things?

CETRULO: Oh, they did. My course was always titled as Basic Poli/Sci,

you know, but you can teach that any number of ways, and you know andyou've probably had experience with that and so I taught it not onlyas a functions of government, executive, judicial, uh legislative16:00branches and federalism, state, central government, distribution ofpowers. I also taught it and used the opportunity to teach 'em aboutdecisions of the Kentucky Supreme Court. I still have my binder withthe decisions that I used in all those various fields and developmentof the constitutional jurisprudence uh and I think they enjoyed that.

KLEE: I'm sure they did. What kinds of changes did you see in students?

You started in the late '50s and you were right in the middle of the'60s there uh did, does that, any of that stick in your mind as far asthey was they dressed, they way they act, how prepared they were--

CETRULO: Not really. I think that by the time I retired it probably

would have been on the cutting edge of what we refer to as they socialrevolution, you know and I didn't experience any of that. But it'snot just the time, it's the location. This was community such that17:00uh where traditional values have attained, you've probably experiencedthat in your community as well. This is not uh New York City or SanFrancisco uh and still isn't. And certainly was parochial in thebetter sense of the word. Uh, and I didn't see much change in thestudents the eleven years I taught there.

KLEE: More traditional, conservative type students.

CETRULO: Right.

KLEE: Didn't have a lot of student discipline problems?

CETRULO: I'd say not.

KLEE: Yeah.

CETRULO: I'd say not.

KLEE: Uh, as I said I'm pretty well through my list of questions. There

was uh we mentioned on the phone when I talked that Paul Shot was theperson that was familiar with the college for a long time. Did youhave contact with him?

CETRULO: I did. Now, Paul was secretary as I recall, to uh Dr. Hankins

uh who was the administrator of the school, uh at the time and directorhe was called, his proper title. Uh, and uh, so I would see Paul with18:00some frequency and I haven't seen him for years though.

KLEE: I'm going to try to check into it and see if I can talk to him.

Uh, can you think of anything in reference to your teaching timethere, the people, or the location that I've failed to ask you about?

CETRULO: No. Uh, I think it was a, in my own personal life was a very

unique and rewarding experience. I hope I made a contribution tothe student body uh, and it was a well received institution in thiscommunity.

KLEE: You said that uh you know you run into some of these people and

they talk to you. Did they seem to have pretty good success when theywent on to other places?

CETRULO: Yes.

KLEE: I mean academically you think?

CETRULO: Yes.

KLEE: So the two years gave 'em a good preparation.

CETRULO: Indeed.

KLEE: Uh, what about the the politics of the area as far as uh --you

19:00know you had to, they built this, I guess Northern, they added U of Llater, but northern is I guess the most recent full blown college thatwas created uh and as I said that late '60s period was the time thathappened. Were there some movers and shakers here in the area thatkind of prompted that?

CETRULO: There were. Uh, of course, the main thrust uh that developed

into the Northern Kentucky University as you know occurred under theadministration of Louie B. Nunn in 1963. Uh but uh I'd say that the,it's predecessor institution about which we're speaking, had the,enjoyed wide support uh and was apolitical in the sense of the word,although great latitude was given, I would bring in people occasionallyevery semester to speak to the student body, to expose them to a wideruh exposure. I recall some that stick out in my mind, one time Ibrought in uh Bob Taft, Jr. that's the uh father of the most recent20:00governor when he was U. S. senator from Cincinnati and uh, I brought inalso Ned Breathitt, who was a friend of mine from uh later became, wasrunning for governor at the time. So there was democrat and republicanand I used to bring in those kind of people to uh expose the studentbody.

KLEE: Uh, you I guess, that's quite significant, you were lucky to get

those people to come up here, uh. Did students react pretty positively?

CETRULO: Oh, they did. These were politicians running for office so

they were happy to have the exposure as well you understand. (laughs)But they made contributions to uh the student body.

KLEE: Oh, sure. Of course, Breathitt was the fellow that helped, I mean

that's where Maysville came from, uh that was during his administrationthat Maysville became a community college or at least was uh --

CETRULO: Classmate of mine in law school had gone to name Tom Sawyers

is now dead, but he'd gone to practice at that firm and later becomebecame a judge down in Christian County uh and was a partner of Ned'swho was younger, but uh my age and Ned's considerably older than I am,21:00now dead, of course. But uh the--

CETRULO: Before, before that it became part of the uh Northern Kentucky

University and then it became the sole location of the law school fora time. After the law school moved from Cincinnati as you know, SimonP. Chase was an affiliate of the, of the YMCA there in Cincinnatiand night school primarily, and it moved over here and its first mainlocation was at uh at this facility where I taught.

KLEE: You said you left in '69 that's when as I said Northern started.

Did you, did you make contact, did any of these people that were atthe center, did they dovetail into Northern that you are aware of?

CETRULO: You know, I, I sort of lost contact with the official structure

and activities of the organization of the facilities and therefore, Ireally can't say that, I don't know.

KLEE: Yeah, I can check that in other places. I was just curious --

CETRULO: We had another very interesting faculty member I forgot to

mention to you. He is not on this list because he had gone by this23:00time. Uh, and suddenly I'm having a senior moment, his name escapesme. The fellow who wrote the book, "The Hustler".

KLEE: Oh my --

CETRULO: And he was an English professor, young fresh English professor

at the Northern Center with me and the--

KLEE: Is that right?

CETRULO: Yeah. And --

KLEE: I'll look that, I'll look that up.

CETRULO: And he uh achieved, of course, instance notoriety and wealth as

you know when he sold his book rights. He asked me to do some researchto find out a tax friendly jurisdiction to establish residence and Ilost contact with him and uh he left teaching and --

KLEE: Yeah (laughs). That's the way it would be. Yeah, I'll check that

out that's really interesting. Well, I appreciate you talking to me.

CETRULO: Happy to do it. Thank you for coming, appreciate your

interest. I think it's an important project that you're making aconnection between the present and the past and uh the contributions24:00made by a lot of these people.